I completely understand where that is coming from and it was well-written.

Both sides are talking past the other.

Once you believe (as the NCAA seemed to, following the lead of the Freeh Report) that the McQueary allegation was not reported in order to protect the reputation of the football program, all punishments are justified. I think even non-insane Penn State fans would accept the logic of that.

Even if it wasn’t a cover-up, as many Penn State fans conclude, the best-case defense is that you somehow rationalized a pretty serious allegation about child abuse that allowed/enabled the perpetrator to continue and victimize others. At the very least, some humility is in order.

I had hoped the football success would lead people to look forward rather than continuing to look back with anger and resentment instead of humility. And it seems to have had that effect a bit. But tribes are going to tribe.

I had hoped the football success would lead people to look forward rather than continuing to look back with anger and resentment instead of humility. And it seems to have had that effect a bit. But tribes are going to tribe.

I think the next time we achieve a “first since the sanctions” we’ll see some of this. But with each landmark victory, it becomes less and less about the past and more and more about the future. Saturday night was about the kids who stayed committed to PSU through it all. Guys like Sickels and Mahon signed up not knowing whether or not they’d ever get to play in a bowl game. We were supposed to be eligible this season, but with the scholarship limits, getting to 6 wins wasn’t going to be a sure thing. So to win the B1G championship so unexpectedly was a very emotional thing for the players and us fans.

I can understand the Jim Delany / Mark Emmert vitriol. Akeel Lynch said he thought 95% of the team was going to transfer. We would have had the death penalty without it actually being official. Somehow we managed to keep it together and here we are. Chest thumping is allowed to a certain degree. Just hope we are reasonably humble about it.

Next up, hope we beat up on USC. If OSU, Michigan, Wisconsin and PSU all win (OSU vs. Clemson at least), it will justify the B1G as the best conference and will help us from the start next season.

Once you believe (as the NCAA seemed to, following the lead of the Freeh Report) that the McQueary allegation was not reported in order to protect the reputation of the football program, all punishments are justified. I think even non-insane Penn State fans would accept the logic of that.

I had hoped the football success would lead people to look forward rather than continuing to look back with anger and resentment instead of humility. And it seems to have had that effect a bit. But tribes are going to tribe

I can’t help but feel that there is a huge oxymoron in that line of thinking.

The school allowed child rapes to continue to protect the football program, and the success of that football program.

…so, we should forget about the child rapes (or “put it behind us”) when the football program wins?

The rapes were overlooked for the betterment of the football team, so we should overlook those rapes with the team gets better? I just don’t get it.

If we overlooked the assaults for some other reason - such as because we thought they didn’t happen (which is the best-case, “Sandusky fooled everyone” defense) - then you could be justified in saying the football team put behind it an unjustified punishment.

A retired football coach’s sexual assault was reported to the administration. If its response was not related to protecting the reputation of the football program, then the punishment was unjustified.

The real oxymoron is that the “football team” McQ and Joe were the only ones who reported the incident and they were the ones who were vilified. Any cover up was performed by the Administration not the “football team”. i.e. AD, VP and Pres.

Penn State went out of their way to show that these things were purposely done to circumvent the justice system and protect the program, not because Sandusky “fooled” anyone.- The Freeh report, paid for by the Board of Trustees, showed as much- The firing and subsequent vilifying of Paterno shows this. Seriously, why would Paterno still be vilified if he was simply “fooled” like the rest of us?- Penn State all but admitted as such when they negotiated and accepted the penalties.

Does that sound like your first, or your second scenario? Does that sound like a university that feels it was “fooled”, or a university that admits that it did wrong?

The university followed a PR strategy that had little to do with whether they were guilty of anything or not. They were looking for a path of least resistance, not a path of truth and accuracy.

I agree with Lar. Whether that was in Penn State’s best interest or a lack of backbone is another cleavage for the alumni base. I thought it was the right decision at the time, and still believe so, but the other argument is a principled one (beneath all the 409 idolatry). I’m not sure how to objectively judge any of the counterfactuals - how different would things be?

I thought the actions enabled us to absorb a pretty heavy blow and begin to rebuild. Mitchell offered a chance to credibly claim “change” from a PR perspective and Delany worked behind the scenes to reverse the sanctions.

Reputations were sacrificed, no question. Paterno’s and McQueary’s with the least to justify.

It was ruthless, but there was a lot beyond football riding on it. For a large university to persist in defending what seemed to most indefensible would have been quixotic and damaging to the core enterprise - the school.

Doesn’t seem to be … Sara did a series on TSM in 2012 when she was still with the Patriot News, but nothing has been released (as many have pointed out here) on TSM by any investigative body that I can find. Here are the links, with my (hopefully) objective summary characterization of the series below them, followed by my subjective take on the matter.

The Second Mile wasn't going to be the entity to make the Jerry Sandusky child sex abuse investigation public. Anything it was preparing -- letters for donors, for teachers, counselors, parents, and the community -- would go out only in response to...

Development director Bonnie Marshall was out every day asking people to write checks to the charity: "I'm feeling more and more that, yes, I was deliberately kept out of things I should have known about and that my staff should have known about," she...

Two former board members, both speaking on the condition of anonymity, said the executive committee was like an exclusive schoolyard club. "Us volunteers were rank-and-file," one said. "We showed up and went through the agenda and went home. I never...

My summaryPart 1: Sandusky resigned from TSM in 2009 because he had been under investigation for child molestation for a year and had lost his clearance to work with children. He informed the board. A law firm conducting an internal review for TSM abandoned it because the state asked its to keep quiet about it (state was investigating).

Part 2: Background on the TSM resignation. Sandusky told TSM’s Jack Raykovitz in November 2008, a year before his resignation, that he was under investigation for molesting a boy. Raykovitz told Sandusky to stay away from children - at TSM events and outside TSM events. After a 2009 Children and Youth Services hearing on the charge in which the boy said he was subjected to mutual oral sex with Sandusky over a period of months, Sandusky loses his clearance. When Sandusky dropped his appeal of that ruling, Raykovitz said he had to resign and be honest with the board about why. No investigative authorities had alerted TSM about the 2008 charge or investigation. TSM opts to stay quiet about investigation (at least in part because the state had urged it to do so so as not to impede its ongoing investigation - see Part 1); the story remains that “Sandusky retired” in November 2009.

Part 3: TSM Development Director Bonnie Marshall, hired in 2009 and put in the loop about the child molestation allegation soon after hiring, asks Raykovitz is anything had ever happened before. Raykovitz tells her about Curley’s 2001 report. that “something inappropriate” happened in the showers and that Sandusky was banned from bringing kids to campusFIX: Marshall quoted Raykovitz as saying, ‘Yes, we knew of something in 2001 that Tim Curley talked to me about.’ At that point, I didn’t particularly want to know any more and he didn’t volunteer anything else.” Real estate investor Bruce Heim recalled that he asked Raykovitz in 2001 if anything inappropriate had happened, and Raykovitz told Heim that based on what Curley had told him, nothing had. Raykovitz asked Heim if he should inform the whole TSM board, and Heim said no: “I said I don’t think it’s relevant. It happens every day at the YMCA. I remember the conversation specifically because it seemed like a nonstarter because of what Penn State said went on.” Only a few people at TSM knew of the 2001 allegation before the grand jury presentment broke that news to them.

Part 4: The 1998 investigations by the state Department of Welfare and DA Ray Gricar should have resulted in no findings of wrongdoing, but TSM and Child Welfare were required to develop a safety plan once the allegation against Sandusky was made. It appears that TSM was never notified, and no safety plan was created. In other words, until November 2008, the only allegation TSM knew about was the one Curley passed along to them in 2001, and which TSM officials have said Curley characterized to them as nothing inappropriate.

Part 5: TSM was an insular organization run by only a handful of people and many board members were completely out of the loop.

My Bottom Line:

The parallels to the Penn State Sandusky story are amazing - and probably similar to other cases of child sexual abuse in similar organizations. Allegations were given short-shrift, few people were told about them, legally required safety mechanisms (the safety plan required following the 1998 allegation) were not executed.

To me, this is also the best “defense” that Penn State administrators have, from part 4:

[TSM Development Officer Myra] Toomey and [Bonnie] Marshall said they understood that when working with troubled kids, there is always a risk of being accused.

Sandusky had such a great reputation, it seemed impossible.

mjg:

I’d like to know why nobody at the second mile has been charged.

Regarding why no one from TSM has been charged, it seems like the explanatory narrative that this provides is:

TSM was never informed of the 1998 investigation, so no culpability

Curley told TSM that nothing inappropriate happened in the shower in 2001, but PSU was prohibiting Jerry from bringing kids to campus, so no culpability.

When Sandusky told Raykovitz about the 2008 investigation, Raykovitz told Sandusky not to work with kids, and when the 2009 hearing on the charge resulted in Sandusky losing his clearance and Sandusky dropped his appeal, Raykovitz made Sandusky resign and inform the board about why, so no culpability - the triggering allegation was already being investigated

TSM did a lot that can be second-guessed, but according to this narrative painted by Ganim’s reporting, the red flags were a lot less bright than they seem to have been for Curley and Schultz.

The entirety of Penn State’s liability in this matter seems to me to be Curley’s handling of McQueary’s allegation. Schultz and Spanier are implicated because they participated in the process that was delegated to Curley (by virtue of his position as AD), and Paterno may have had a role suggested by Curley’s cryptic reference to changing his mind about how to handle the allegation* after talking with Paterno.

*It’s not certain what exactly changed for Curley; one possible reading is that he decided to confront Sandusky directly rather than inform child protective agencies, another is that he decided to confront Sandusky directly in addition to informing child protective agencies. There is apparently no record of Curley informing the state; however, records of investigations in which no wrongdoing is found must be expunged from the state registry.

Interesting to me in the Moulton Report (and I haven’t read all 330+ pages yet) is the notion that even though the 1998 records had to be expunged, little effort was made to garner “institutional knowledge” about the '98 allegations from the Centre County DA’s office. I suspect the same might have happened with 2001 - did anybody attempt to find out whether Curley did pass along the allegation? I believe Schultz testified that he thought Curley had. Would be a massive MacGuffin if he did so - and then Penn State administrators surely would be criticized for their settlements with victims. I personally find it hard to believe that this would not have been investigated by someone - especially insurance company investigators - but we’ve all seen where “impossible to believe” has gotten folks throughout this tragedy.

NOTE: I made lots of edits - some to correct mistakes, others to add clarity. I marked some of them with strike-throughs (the mistakes, primarily). If you don’t know, though, I believe everyone (not just admins/moderators) can see all revisions by clicking the orange edit notification in the top right of a post.

when the 2009 hearing on the charge resulted in Sandusky losing his clearance and Sandusky dropped his appeal, Raykovitz made Sandusky resign and inform the board about why

I’m a bit confused about this.

On one hand, part 3 of the “special report” says Bonnie Marshal was told about the allegations right after she was hired in 2009. But a few paragraphs later, it goes on to add.

Considering that Marshall was out every day asking people to write checks to the charity, “I’m feeling more and more that, yes, I was deliberately kept out of things I should have known about and that my staff should have known about,” she said. “We were brought in much later than what would have been above board.”

I know some who joined the Second Mile board shortly before the allegations hit the fan, and he says was never told anything,

So I questioned who Raykovitz told in 2009 (perhaps just the executive board) and what exactly he said (Marshall seems to feel she wasn’t told the full story in 2009).

TSM did a lot that can be second-guessed, but according to this narrative painted by Ganim’s reporting, the red flags were a lot less bright than they seem to have been for Curley and Schultz.

While I agree somewhat with the assertion, I would add that, as a trained psychologist working with a child welfare organization, Jack Raykovitz should have been able to recognize dim red flags, perhaps even better than Tim Curley, an athletic director with a phys ed degree, could be expected to recognize bright red ones.

2001 Raykovitz asks Heim if he should tell the board. Heim says no. At this point only Raykovitz and Heim seem to know about 2001, although one might suspect that Genovese did, too

Nov 2008 – Jerry tells Raykovitz he is being investigated

Early in 2009 – Raykovitz tells Marshall about the molestation charge shortly after she is hired, and about Curley’s 2001 report (without details)

Sometime in 2009 – Jerry has hearing, after which his clearance is revoked

Later in 2009 - but unclear if this is before or after Marshall is informed of charge – Jerry drops his appeal of that revocation, and the insistence he would do so seemed to give Raykovitz time to wait. After he dropped it, though, Raykovitz says he needs to tell the board

Sometime before presentment – Raykovitz and Genovese learn that other allegations are being investigated

I didn’t find the special report very clear in some areas. For example, the short Part 1 wasn’t explained until Part 2. I think that for some reason, “Five Part Series” is something journalists (and journalists presume their readers) find more “SPECIAL REPORT” than “Four Part Series”. Attention Daniel Kahneman.

UncleLar:

While I agree somewhat with the assertion, I would add that, as a trained psychologist working with a child welfare organization, Jack Raykovitz should have been able to recognize dim red flags, perhaps even better than Tim Curley, an athletic director with a phys ed degree, could be expected to recognize bright red ones.

Agreed. However, it appears from the narrative Ganim provided, aside from the 2001 Curley report, all the things Raykovitz is being told about were already being investigated by the proper authorities.